The municipality of Saint-Gilles in Brussels has opened a new facility devoted entirely to young children and youth.
Housed on the former site of the Brussels’ Central School of Arts and Crafts, ECAM, the new complex spans over 7,500 square metres. It is a stone’s throw from the Saint-Gilles barrier, within the block formed by Fernand Bernier, du Tir, Théodore Verhaegen and Montenegro streets.
As part of the ‘Bosnia’ sustainable neighbourhood agreement launched in 2012, the site was repurposed and thoroughly renovated, thanks to a €24 million investment from the Brussels-Capital Region, Beliris and the municipality of Saint-Gilles.
The densely populated neighbourhood had been recognised as lacking services and facilities, particularly sports-related ones, for young citizens, the municipality explains.
The additional greenery and the improvement of local environmental quality and living conditions were fundamental to the terms of the neighbourhood agreement.
The ECAM site, vacant since 2012, offered “an opportunity to meet these challenges, by mobilising and centralising the many players in the fields of youth and social cohesion that were already active in the vicinity,” the municipality notes.
The site now hosts an urban park featuring a playground, a 149-place crèche with a garden at the back, a new kitchen that will benefit all municipal crèches and two multipurpose sports halls (150 and 200 square metres).
The site futher includes an indoor sports ground (400 square metres), along with premises for the municipal prevention service’s school support unit and associations dedicated to youth and social cohesion.
